More than a dozen U.S. states reached or exceeded their pre-pandemic employment levels in March, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
After massive job losses during the early stages of the pandemic, the latest numbers show a strong recovery, with the Rocky Mountain states reporting the best results.
Utah, Idaho, and Montana are leading the nation in employment growth in March, reporting the fastest return to February 2020 levels. Arizona and Colorado had all recovered their losses, with Nevada, Wyoming and New Mexico slightly behind.
According to the latest report by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the U.S. economy added 431,000 jobs in March and the unemployment rate fell to 3.6 percent.
Results represents a decline from jobs numbers in February, when 678,000 people were hired dropping the national unemployment rate to 3.8 percent. Upward revisions added an additional combined 95,000 jobs to the past two months’ reports.
The South has also emerged as a strong region for job recovery with surges in Texas, Florida, North Carolina, Georgia and Tennessee. Other states that have made a full employment recovery include Arkansas, South Dakota and Indiana.
Many coastal cities and states that implemented strict restrictions when the pandemic started are going through a different process, since the early confinement negatively affected tourism, leisure and hospitality industries.
